Best Diablo 4 dungeons and strongholds to farm, according to someone who did the math

As we get closer and closer to the start of Diablo 4’s first season, Season of the Malignant, the most savvy players are seemingly channeling all of their experience into producing guides on the best and most efficient ways to grind.

Since everyone will need to create new characters to level up the Season 1 Battle Pass and experience Season 1 content, there’s something of an unspoken race to see how efficiently you can work in the first few hours and how quickly you can unlock the battle pass tiers.

We recently covered this map of all the side quests that lead to dungeons, which itself is a great source of Renown. Today, we have an even more impressive amount of information, courtesy of the content creator. dry bear.

Drybear tested Diablo 4’s 115 dungeons and 15 strongholds to determine which ones were best suited for fast leveling (both for solo players and groups), as well as those that grant the most XP. There are several factors that determine how much XP a dungeon/fortress offers, including the density of the mob and elite, and how quickly you can clear them.

The content creator found that the best way to earn XP/level up is to fight enemies three levels higher than you. In other words, the most efficient way to earn XP is to target dungeons and strongholds when you are three levels below their minimum (there is a master list with all the relevant information, too).

This is also true for Nightmare Dungeons, although the calculation is slightly different. In that case, you want your character’s level to be 51 points below that of the dungeon, which is equal to three levels.

All that work brought us this detailed, yet easy-to-read list. As you can see, there are dedicated sections not only for players leveling up, but for future XP grinding once the first few levels are completed. The list also recognizes solo and party leveling, which is great for solo players, as many XP guides tend to assume you have at least one other player nearby.

When Season of the Malignant begins on July 20 (assuming you’ve already done everything on this list to prepare), you’ll need to follow the leveling sections of that list to get into the level 50+ zone as quickly as possible. possible. . From there, it’s all about optimizing your time vs. XP gain when it comes to whatever dungeons and fortresses you decide to grind for.

As for how Drybear arrived at these results, they tested with a level 100 character to avoid altering the enemy’s level or character properties during the test. Results do not include shrines, events, treasure goblins, or butcher encounters. In other words, the numbers only take into account the main mobs in a given dungeon/stronghold.

As immensely useful as this list is, we hope today’s big Diablo 4 patch doesn’t alter the enemy density in those dungeons and strongholds, or make any other changes to XP gain that could make it biased or totally useless.